SOAN 2040 Chapter Notes - Chapter 2: Labour Power, Deskilling, Social Alienation

• School: University of Guelph
• Department: Sociology and Anthropology
• Course: SOAN 2040
• Professor: Rodriguez

Document Summary

For marx, alienation was both inevitable and universal in capitalist societies, but it could be overcome. Alienation according to marx: is rooted in structure of industrial capitalism, all means for the development if production transform themselves into means of domination over the producers; basically supresses. Estranged labour tears them away from his species in life: 4) social alienation: workers are alienated from each other. Marx claimed that industrial capitalism suppressed creativity. Industrial capitalism: immorality, deformity, and dulling of the workers and capitalists. Seeman"s 5 different meanings of alienation: 1) powerlessness, 2) meaninglessness, 3) normlessness, 4) isolation, and 5) self- estrangement. Blauner accepted the marxian premise that there are powerful alienating tendencies in modern factory technology and industrial organization, but. Rejected the assumption that alienation was inevitable under industrial capitalism on the grounds that the alienating tendencies emphasized by marx are unevenly distributed among the labour force. Critique of blauner"s alienation thesis: methodological, theoretical/ conceptual, interpretative.